A Justice Department civil rights investigation has concluded that the Ferguson Police Department and the city's municipal court engaged in a "pattern and practice" of discrimination against African Americans, targeting them disproportionately for traffic stops, use of force, and jail sentences, according to a U.S. law enforcement official briefed on the investigation.

The probe is the result of an investigation ordered by Attorney General Eric Holder after the police shooting that killed Michael Brown last summer.

Among the findings, reviewed by CNN: from 2012 to 2014, 85% of people subject to vehicle stops by Ferguson police were African American; 90% of those who received citations were black; and 93% of people arrested were black. This while 67% of the Ferguson population is black.

In 88% of the cases in which police the Ferguson police reported using force, it was against African Americans. During the period 2012-2014 black drivers were twice as likely as white drivers to be searched during traffic stops, but 26% less likely to be found in possession of contraband.

Blacks were disproportionately more likely to be cited for minor infractions: 95% of tickets for "manner of walking in roadway," essentially jaywalking, were against African Americans. Also, 94% of all "failure to comply" charges were filed against black people.

The findings in the investigation are expected to be made public as soon as Wednesday, and the Justice Department is expected to pursue a court-supervised consent decree that requires the city of Ferguson to make changes to its police and courts.

According to the findings, reviewed by CNN, African Americans were 68% less likely to have their cases dismissed by a Ferguson municipal judge, and were overwhelmingly more likely to be arrested during traffic stops solely for an outstanding warrant by the Ferguson courts.

The investigators found evidence of racist jokes being sent around by Ferguson police and court officials. One November 2008 email read in part that President Barack Obama wouldn't likely be President for long because "what black man holds a steady job for four years."

Another jokes that made the rounds on Ferguson government email in May 2011 said: "An African American woman in New Orleans was admitted into the hospital for a pregnancy termination. Two weeks later she received a check for $3000. She phoned the hospital to ask who it was from. The hospital said: 'Crimestoppers.'"

The federal jury selected Tuesday is made up of eight men and 10 women, many of whom said they believed Tsarnaev was involved in the 2013 bombings that killed three people and left at least 264 injured.

The 18-member jury -- 12 primary jurors and six alternates -- includes a house painter eager to "serve my country," a man in his 20s who practices the Baha'i faith and speaks Farsi, and a water department employee who said he thinks the death penalty would be "the easy way out."

They will determine whether Tsarnaev is guilty of participating in the bombing, and they could be asked to impose the death penalty if they decide he is.

Tsarnaev is charged with one count of using and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death and one count of malicious destruction of property by means of an explosive device resulting in death.

Prosecutors accuse Tsarnaev of working with his brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, to set off two bombs made from pressure cookers near the marathon's crowded finish line.

The bombs, packed with BB-like pellets and nails, exploded 12 seconds apart, spraying the crowd with shrapnel. The victims included an 8-year-old boy, a 29-year-old woman and a graduate student from China.

Three days later, authorities say, the brothers killed a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer, then led police on a wild chase in which they threw explosives out the car windows and exchanged gunfire with police.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev died in the mayhem that night. He had been shot, suffered injuries from an explosion and had been run over by his fleeing brother, according to authorities.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was found the next day, hiding in a boat in the backyard of a home in Watertown, Massachusetts.

Although Massachusetts hasn't had a death penalty on its books in three decades, and the state hasn't executed anyone since 1947, the death penalty is an option because the case is being tried in federal court -- where the death penalty remains an option for some crimes, including terror-related offenses.

Many of the jurors who made the final cut seemed willing to consider the death penalty.

One juror, a restaurant manager, said she would have no problem choosing the death penalty if the evidence was there. "I don't feel like I'm sending someone to death or life in prison," she said. "Their actions got them there. I'm following the law."

Another woman, an executive assistant at a law firm, said initially that she wasn't sure she could vote for the death penalty. But under questioning, she reconsidered, saying, "If I came to that decision based on the evidence I heard, then yes."

(CNN) -- A Justice Department civil rights investigation has concluded that the Ferguson Police Department and the city's municipal court engaged in a "pattern and practice" of discrimination against African Americans, targeting them disproportionately for traffic stops, use of force, and jail sentences, according to a U.S. law enforcement official briefed on the investigation.
The probe is the result of an investigation ordered by Attorney General Eric Holder after the police shooting that killed Michael Brown last summer.
Among the findings, reviewed by CNN: from 2012 to 2014, 85% of people subject to vehicle stops by Ferguson police were African American; 90% of those who received citations were black; and 93% of people arrested were black. This while 67% of the Ferguson population is black.